The Sapphire Shadow

Chapter Twenty-One: Performative Charity

It was ugly, really. Hideous. Flashy and gauche and much too ostentatious.

The Structure was lit up, the one and only time of year this happened. Dazzling displays of color blinked up and down its length, piercing rays of light sweeping out and up and down.

The annual Charity Ball was in full swing, and the whole city knew it.

Nadia stared at her face in the small mirror that rested in her palm. Her pale skin was bruised and marred, an ugly cut wandering through her upper lip. Her sure, sharp blue eyes were surrounded by sunken hollows, and one of her brows was split open, still leaking blood.

Her right hand shook. She clenched it into a trembling fist and glowered at it, counting silent, screaming numbers in her head. Deep breath. When she opened her fist, her hand was still.

Hard to apply first-aid gel—not to mention makeup—with an unsteady hand. She slapped some foundation over her bruises, displeased with the work but knowing she didn't have much time. It didn't have to be perfect, for once. Just enough to get her in the door, just enough to pass the barest of scrutiny.

Close enough. She hiked the collar of her coat up, appearing to be wearing a rather tasteless black turtleneck underneath. Her boots concealed her suit from the knees down.

It was a weak disguise. But her face would get her far enough. And her name. Her cursed name, a boon she could've coasted on her entire life if she'd lacked the dignity to truly make something of herself.

Her name would do her this one last favor, grant her one last privilege. She clicked the mirror shut and dropped it, letting it clatter on the rooftop beneath her feet. Not the moldering roof of the sagging building where she'd left Jackson. No, this was the top of an office building in the very shadow of the Structure, a private little nook nestled between neglected rows of solar panels.

Nadia reached over to a police hoverbike with "Ortega, David L." plastered on the side. On the seat rested Officer Jackson's cherished revolver. The cylinder swung open smoothly and easily, the empty shells popping out with one firm slap of the ejector rod.

A burst of static crackled in her ears. "Are you there?" Tess said.

Nadia fished six spare rounds out of her bag. She slipped them into their waiting chambers slowly, running her gloved fingers over each shiny brass case.

"I can see you made it back inside the walls," Tess said. "I don't have your visual feed, though. Are you okay?"

Fully loaded. The revolver tucked safe and snug in her bag. Nadia stared up at the Structure—she knew there were automated turrets mounted outside the top levels. Anyone or anything foolish enough to fly near the top would be shot to pieces, blown out of the sky without a moment of human hesitation.

"Comms check?" Tess said. "Come on. Check, check..."

Nadia mounted the bike, kicked it to life, and revved the engine, the landing skids lifting off the roof while swirling eddies of light drizzle blew around her. High above her, helipads stuck out of the mid-levels of the Structure. Busily accepting late guests to the festivities.

That was where she would begin.

* * *

Every motion was agony.

Nothing new there. Jackson had felt like this before, wounded and half dead, pushed to the edge after fighting for days and going on fighting all the same. Her breath hitched in her lungs, a sharp ache in every beat of her heart. Like a fist squeezing tight in her chest.

She slammed her locker door shut one last time. Her access still worked at the station—strange but not all that surprising. Police operations in the city were officially ending tomorrow, after all.